32 LAST WALTZ T HE Azay-le-Rideau was one of four Messageries Maritimes liners making the Indo-China run- thirty-fi ve dreary, hot days-from Marseille to Haiphong 'by way of Suez, Djihouti, Colombo) Pondichéry, Ma- dras, Singapore, and Saigon. The pho- tographs in the company's folders were not completely revealing about the Azay-Ie-Rideau. There was one which, by means of ingenious perspective, made the ship's really lamentable lines look actually rakish. Another, a closeup, showed a corner of the dining saloon- three tables, full of crystal, china, silver, and flowers-and the caption read, "Delicious meals, cooked by the G om- pagnie's famous chefs, served in an atmosphere of simple dignity." There was also a picture of the promenade deck which featured two shapely blondes in shorts. But there was no intimation in the folders that the Azay-Ie-Rideau was the company's combination prison and lunatic asylum. Our little, orchestra came aboard her one day in 1930. I was violinist and chef d' orchestre. My companions were Ar- tie, an undernourished-looking pianist from Yonkers, and Pedro, a lethargic cello player from Barcelona, who was forever complaining of the ship's bêtes noires. Every ship has its hugs, but the old, filthy A ay-Ie-Rideau had them in b extraordinary variety. There were com- mon cockroaches behind the washhasins, grayish ones near the portholes, and a domesticated, Wagnerian species which hid in the piano and came out only dur- ing the "Lohengrin" or "'r annhäuser" fantasies. 'rhe liner's commandant was a heavy-set, gray-haired, frequently un- shaved misanthrope of the I van the Ter- rihle type, who had once run one of the company's luxury liners aground near Port Said. The second capitaine was known around Singapore as a junior-grade amuck-runner. The ship's doctor had had to give up a flourishing practice in Marseille when the local police checked up on him. Our immedi- ate superior, the commissaire, was a chronic alcoholic who considered mu- sicians an especially nauseating, noisy species of beetle. The Azav-Ie-Rideau had been a Hapag ship hefore she was handed over to the French as a measly payment on reparaiions. It was no doubt a beau- tiful day for the Hapag people when they got rid of the ship There was al- ways trouble. On this voyage nothing much, except daily fights among the crew, happened in the Mediterranean, but two days out of Suez the engines broke down. The Azay-Ie-Rideau stopped, listed to port, and for two days ln\ J)tA:Y l'No, but you're getting warmer." DECEMDEI\ 9, 1 9 4- 4- we lay motionless in the middle of the Red Sea. The heat was unbearable. The only piano ahoard stood on the stern of the promenade deck, under a roof forIlled hy the overhang of the sun deck :thove. 'rhere were some hasketwork chairs and tahles and two decrepit palm trees in pots there, and a har. Playing music in this hothouse was plain hell. I had to use four metal strings and the hairs of my bow wouldn't hold the resin. Our instru- ments were always covered with mois- ture and the key hoard of the piano was slippery. F requen tly we had to play hy heart, hecause the sweat ran down into our eyes and made it impossible for us to read the music. The passengers would lie in their chairs, sipping iced drinks and wishing they were dead or in Alas- ka. Nobody wanted to listen to music, anyway, so Artie and Pedro and I would have long intermissions between pieces. On the second evening of the breakdown, we were standing near the railing during one of the intermissions. Far across the sea we saw Mount Si- nai, its craggy silhouette outlined in the pale moonlight. Pedro made the fitting observation that the Azay-Ie-Rideau should be chartered by the management of hell for the transportation of lost souls. The ensuing gl00my silence was interrupted (by the barking voice of the commandant) who had sneaked up on us out of the darkness. He wanted to know why we weren't performing our musical duties. Artie pointed out that music was the last thing the passengers wanted. "What do you think they want? " the commandant asked sharply. "Free drinks with plenty of ice," Artie said. "Ges Américains," the commandant said with contempt. "All they think of is drinks and more drinks." At that, Artie hotly defended the honor of his country. In no time the two men were engrossed in a bitter argument which ended, arbitrarily, with the comman- dant's shouting at Artie to shut up and go back to work. From that night on there was war between the commandant and the orchestra. A T Colombo the Five Ferraris came aboard. They were a dynasty of Italian circus acrobats, prominent main- I r on the Bombay circuit, where the customers were not as blasé as at the Cirque Médrano in Paris. The Five Ferraris consisted of Father Ferrari, his three sons, Giuseppe, Gino, Giacomo, and his daughter, Lucia. Father Ferrari was six feet three inches tall. His sons